The Ann Arbor City Council met in Larcom City Hall Monday evening to discuss amendments to Ann Arbor’s 2025 fiscal year budget, new affordable housing projects and increases in city parking fees. Proposed changes to the budgets also included additional funding allocated to eviction prevention, housing assistance and youth services programs.
The meeting began with an announcement by Jennifer Hall, executive director of the Ann Arbor Housing Commission, on the groundbreaking of Dunbar Tower, a new affordable housing complex being built in Kerrytown. Shirley Beckley, Ann Arbor resident and activist, said she felt appreciative to City Council for providing funding and acknowledged the chosen location as a historical center for the Black community and Black-owned businesses.
“Thank you so much for giving us the opportunity of this project for affordable housing, which is needed so much in this town,” Beckley said. “It’s good to see that we’re expanding … affordable housing. The extra topping on the cake is that we’re going to have some of the projects in what was once our local Black business district and Black community.”
Maura Thomson, executive director of the Downtown Development Authority, provided updates regarding the rate increase in city parking fees to $1.50 per hour and the implementation of new Narcan dispensers, which provide free overdose treatment kits, in four parking facilities across the city. In addition, Thomson said a recent analysis of current on-street accessible parking revealed a need for 50 new spaces, which the DDA will be finding ideal locations for in the coming months.
“We did an analysis of all of our blocks,” Thomson said. “The new guidelines base the count on block perimeters, which was a different way of looking at blocks from how we typically look at block faces … so the next phase of this process is actually determining the very best spaces for those 50 spots.”
The council then moved to address the Resolution to Adopt an Americans with Disabilities Act transition plan for Ann Arbor parks. City Councilmember Travis Radina, D-Ward 3, spoke about the project’s focus on expanding accessibility in local parks and said it was important to seek additional funding to complete the project.
“By adopting this plan today, it will put into motion a series of immediate and long-term actions to make our parks and recreation facilities, programming and spaces more accessible,” Radina said. “(Unfortunately), this work is not free, so it does include a commitment to funding over the next 30 years and given the already limited fiscal resources within parks, staff are already working on financing strategies that will likely include federal and state resources, philanthropic dollars, public private partnerships and other ideas.”
The council then discussed proposed amendments to the 2025 fiscal year budget. An amendment moved by City Councilmember Jenn Cornell, D-Ward 5, reintroduced the allocation of $500,000 from the Marijuana Tax Rebate to evenly fund eviction prevention and low-income youth services. In Michigan, the Marihuana Retailers Excise Tax sets a 10% excise tax on all retail Marihuana sales.
Cornell cited data provided by Hall and said the eviction prevention program last year approved 299 out of 352 requests, a majority of whom were people of Color, women and disabled individuals.
“When you look at the data, the folks who were helped most by this were overwhelmingly for our disabled neighbors, women and people of Color,” Cornell said. “And what really struck me was that 63% of the recipients of this service had children. And so we’re talking about families in our communities and keeping them in their homes and I can’t think of a better use for this type of funding and an expression of our values in the community.”
City Councilmember Ayesha Ghazi Edwin, D-Ward 3, expressed her support for the amendment and said the funding greatly supported mental health and youth service programs in her Ward.
“They expressed to me that the funding from this grant helped them to create a mental health behavioral program for youth and hire a behavioral health director,” Ghazi Edwin said. “In addition, during this time when our schools are so strapped for resources, this funding also helps Scarlet and Tappan middle schools to launch an evidence-based program called ‘Check and Connect Mentoring Program,’ which allows (Ann Arbor Public Schools) to (provide) youth behavioral health support beyond the school day.”
This amendment was approved by City Council members.
A further amendment to the budget moved by City Councilmember Cynthia Harrison, D-Ward 1, proposed an additional $100,000 be provided to the Rising Hope for Housing program, which assists individuals impacted by the criminal justice system in securing housing and currently uses $400,000 from the city’s budget.
“The Rising Hope for Housing Program is transforming lives,” Harrison said. “Essential trauma-informed services like mental health counseling, housing, advocacy and job training — these services empower those impacted by the criminal justice system, help lower recidivism rates and increase public safety. For those impacted by the criminal legal system, housing is the foundation of a stable life.”
Ann Arbor Mayor Christopher Taylor (D) gave final remarks about the budget’s importance in providing equitable services and opportunities to Ann Arbor citizens, including human services support, affordable housing, open spaces such as parks and access to clean water.
“This is a balanced budget that accomplishes what our community demands to improve basic services and enhance quality of life,” Taylor said. “It does so with momentum, vision and practicality. It is the budget of the municipal organization that is devoted to making our community better with a drive to deliver the basics that never loses sight of equity needs and our many exciting opportunities in the future.”
The meeting concluded with the adoption of the Resolution to Adopt the Ann Arbor City Budget and Related Property Tax Millage Rates for fiscal year 2025.
Summer News Editor Claudia Minetti can be reached at cminetti@umich.edu.